MR WRONG: A column falls in the forest
Indignity Vol. 5, No. 167
COLUMN DEP’T.
MR WRONG: The MR. WRONG Column Never Misses a Week, but Sometimes by Accident It Misses the Readers
YESTERDAY WAS MY birthday. I had a great birthday! People and robot-emails from brands wished me “Happy Birthday,” and friends and relations, relatives, etc., sent me birthday cards, and presents, even.
My Wonderful Wife baked me a bomb-ass blueberry pie, my fave, and of which I enjoyed a slice for Birthday Breakfast, and then later for Birthday Dinner-Afters, urp! The weekend before, in honor of my Natal Day, my Wife, who has already been established as Wonderful, sported me an all-expenses-expensed trip to Las Vegas, NV, where I ate and drank like it was my Birthday and I was on Vacation, arrooo! We met up with family and friends and I had such a great time that I didn’t even gamble, that’s how much fun I had! Did not touch one casino chip, did not press one button on an electronic poker machine, no keno, nothing. Too busy having a blast!
We flew to Vegas from Baltimore, MD direct to the Harry Reid International Airport, and the day before, last Thursday, I typed last week’s Mr. Wrong column, filed it, got the post for Indignity together, plus a buncha other non-dignity stuff I do to earn my daily bread, working feverishly, the way one does when one is trying to cram all of one’s productivity in to one last work-spurt before one fucks off to be wild non-productive. That’s where the Protestant Work Ethic gets you, I think. No offense to any Protestants, but that’s just what I call how The Man always gets us to feel a little guilty about taking a coupla days off, it gets twisted up into your brain as you are double-timing a buncha stuff in order to get that break, and it creeps in there: Why am I doing this? Is it really worth it? I should just not take the time off, it’s too fuckin’ hard to do all this shit just so I can have a coupla days off...
That’s bullshit, right? Yeah! I was just showing you where my brain was last Thursday, hackin’ away at my work, too much shit goin’ on, tryin’ to get away, I gotta get away!
So now, almost a week later, yesterday, (my Birthday-actual), I was post-Vegas-Vacation back at work, poking around the Indignity site and I noticed that last week’s Indignity post containing the Mr. Wrong column, Indignity Vol. 5, No. 163, COLUMN DEP’T., was not showing up on the Indignity home page. WTF? Did I get fired? Censored? Was Indignity’s Internet broken? Hackers? The Enemy?
Well, I am nothing if not a person-who-sits-at-a-desk-all-day of action, so I executed an immediate and thorough Technical Investigation, and I filed my Report of the Results of that Investigation (thorough), yesterday, to the Editor of Indignity.
I now present, to the Gentle Readers of the Mr. Wrong column, in Full Transparency, the now Declassified and unexpurgated inter-office communication and Official Transcript in regards to that Report:
Argh! I had one fucking job, as they say. I got so caught up in the filing and the setup that when it was ready to go, I already had completion-thought in my head and went away to pack my bag for my well-deserved trip! Anyway, I apologize to anybody out there who mighta been looking last Thursday, if not for the Mr. Wrong column, then for the WEATHER REVIEW or a SANDWICH.
JOE MACLEOD
The Mr. Wrong column regrets the error! A whole column, did not press the button! Indignity Vol. 5, No. 163 didn’t go out as an email, but it is up on the site now, dammit. I will stop now and we’ll have a PART TWO, wherein I unpack from my Vegas Vacation, next week!
The MR. WRONG COLUMN is a general-interest column appearing weekly. No refunds. Write Wrong: wrongcolumn@gmail.com.
WEATHER REVIEWS
New York City, September 17, 2025
★★ The morning rain in the forecast had been pushed back far enough that it was possible to look out at the feathery clouds on the blue early sky and hope it might never show up. By noon, though, the sky was gray and the air was damp, and it was so cold that there was no point in even thinking about shorts. It rained enough uptown to cancel recess and make the ninth graders eat lunch in a weird place, the returning student reported. If it had rained in the neighborhood during the busy hours, though, it did so while leaving the ground dry and the litter undisturbed.
EASY LISTENING DEP'T.
HERE IS TODAY'S Indignity Morning Podcast!
Tom Scocca
Here is the Indignity Morning Podcast archive!
TOM SCOCCA
ADVICE DEP'T.
HEY! DO YOU like advice columns? They don't happen unless you send in some letters! Surely you have something you want to justify to yourself, or to the world at large. Now is the perfect time to share it with everyone else through The Sophist, the columnist who is not here to correct you, but to tell you why you're right. Direct your questions to The Sophist, at indignity@indignity.net, and get the answers you want.
SANDWICH RECIPES DEP'T.
WE PRESENT INSTRUCTIONS in aid of the assembly of sandwiches selected from British Everyday Cookery, published by Whitcombe and Tombs in 1910 and available at archive.org for the delectation of all.
HAM SANDWICHES.
One lb. minced boiled ham, 1 oz. butter, 1 egg, pepper and mustard, 2 or 3 potatoes.
Have floury potatoes (baked or boiled) mashed fine with the butter. Add the beaten egg to the potato. Then mix with the minced or pounded ham (potted ham does nicely); add a little mustard and cayenne pepper, and use between thin slices of buttered bread.
If you decide to prepare and attempt to enjoy a sandwich inspired by this offering, be sure to send a picture to indignity@indignity.net .
SELF-SERVING SELF-PROMOTION DEP'T.
Indignity is presented on Ghost. Indignity recommends Ghost for your Modern Publishing needs. Indignity gets a slice if you do this successfully!
